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Baby Samantha is clearly dazzled by the colorful array of fuzzy squeaker toys hanging on the wall before her.

Born 16 months ago in Guatemala, Samantha is learning fast about her new home, spending her days in her adoptive parents’ Harbor City pet store.

She giggles with delight as Dad kneels down with her in front of a well-stocked store rack, squeaking one of the stuffed dog toys.

Welcome to America, Samantha – land of freedom, opportunity and plenty.

With dancing coal-black eyes, Samantha has already perfected a cute “princess” wave and blows kisses at store visitors – moves she recently honed after studying the likes of Cinderella and Snow White in last Sunday’s glittering Disney’s Electrical Parade.

And today, this new, pint-size U.S. citizen will get yet another taste of Americana as her family gathers for a Fourth of July picnic.

Finding a red-white-and-blue outfit will be no problem, her mom said.

Customers of their store, Kritter Korral at Western Avenue and Palos Verdes Drive North, have brought in a “bazillion” clothes for the new arrival, Melissa said.

“I think she’s clothed until she’s 5,” she said.

The best thing about having Samantha home, said David Jones, 33, is “not missing anything” for the rest of her childhood.

Herparents beam as they talk about Samantha, who has joined a household that includes David’s three teen daughters.

“She’s so easy,” said Melissa, 28. “She goes to sleep happy, she wakes up happy. She’s always happy. She is just so good.

“She has the funniest personality. She cracks us up.”

If anyone’s happier than Samantha, it’s her parents, who endured several months of uncertainty toward the end of their long. overseas adoption proceedings.

Working through a licensed U.S. adoption agency, the couple began routine proceedings just two days after Samantha was born on Feb. 21, 2007.

Her birth mother had relinquished rights to her during the pregnancy and Samantha was placed in a Guatemalan foster home where the Joneses visited her five times throughout 2007.

They’d hoped to bring her home before last Christmas.

But they hit a snag when efforts to bring Guatemala into compliance with international adoption standards unexpectedly threw all of the Central American countries pending adoptions into limbo last fall.

Months of telephone calls, prayers and tears followed as the couple navigated what had become a political tug of war played out 2,000 miles away.

“We were really each other’s support system,” Melissa said. “There were days when I’d be really upset and he’d be positive. The next day he’d be down and I’d be positive.”

Through it all, she said, “I kept thinking, `This is my child. I have to fight for her, I have to keep going.’

“Whether or not she came home with us in the end, I knew it would be whatever God wanted,” Melissa said. “But at the same time, I kept thinking, `I really want this to happen, doesn’t he know?”‘

Then came the telephone call: “You were released (from the adoption court) this morning.”

“I was just crying,” Melissa said.

The couple finally brought Samantha home on March 27.

It was worth the wait, Melissa said, “a million times over.”

While they missed a few babyhood milestones, David and Melissa – “mamma” and “dadda” – are quickly catching up with their new daughter, who is developing her social skills and loves riding in the shopping cart at the grocery store, the faster the better.

“She’s going to be our thrill-seeker,” Melissa said.

Samantha is the center of attention at the pet store, where customers have lavished toys and clothes on the budding toddler – who, by the way, loves animals. And books.

A welcome home party was given by the family’s church, Rolling Hills Covenant.

Samantha is proving to be a quick study at home.

“I’m a neat freak and she’s a neat freak,” Melissa said. “She’ll pick up the most minuscule piece of lint on the floor and hand it to me.”

Samantha’s U.S. citizenship papers arrived in the mail a month ago.

Americanized yet?

“Oh yeah, I think she’s already here,” Melissa said.

The couple said they were surprised by some criticism they received after the Daily Breeze published a story last fall about the pending adoption. Critics took them to task for not adopting a child from the United States.

“I didn’t realize there was a border to kindness,” Melissa said. In Guatemala, Samantha would have had few of the opportunities she’ll enjoy in America.

Samantha will grow up in a family committed to teaching her about her homeland as well as about other cultures around the world. On the menu for today’s Fourth of July barbecue? Carne asada.

David and Melissa, who plan to either home-school Samantha or send her to a private school, said they’d be thrilled if she grew up someday to be a Christian missionary in another country.

Maybe, Melissa said, she’ll even return to Guatemala to serve the people there.

“She’s always going to be a Guatemalan,” Melissa said. “Those are her roots. We could be bringing up this amazing person who could change her country.”

But that’s still years away – years filled with bedtime stories and Christmas trees and summer swim lessons.

“She was just meant for us,” Melissa said. “It’s amazing. Every day I wake up and I’m just so thankful we have her here.”

Donna Littlejohn has covered the Harbor Area as a reporter since 1981. Along with development, politics, coyotes, battleships and crime, she writes features that have spotlighted an array of topics, from an alligator on the loose in a city park to the modern-day cowboys who own the trails on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. She loves border collies and Aussie dogs, cats, early California Craftsman architecture and most surviving old stuff. She imagines the 1970s redevelopment sweep that leveled so much of San Pedro's historic waterfront district as very sad.